84 THE STORY OF THE LIVING MACHINE. 



reached. Huxley named his substance Bathybias, 

 and this name became in a short time familiar 

 to every one who was thinking of the problems 

 of life. But the discovery was suspected from 

 the first, because it was too closely in accord 

 with speculation, and it was soon disproved. Its 

 discoverer soon after courageously announced 

 to the world that he had been entirely mistaken, 

 and that the Bathybias, so far from being nn- 

 differentiated protoplasm, was not an organic 

 product at all, but simply a mineral deposit in 

 the sea water made by purely artificial means. 

 Bathybias stands therefore as an instance of a too 

 precipitate advance in speculation, which led even 

 such a brilliant man as Prof. Huxley into an un- 

 fortunate error of observation ; for, beyond ques- 

 tion, he would never have made such a mistake 

 had he not been dominated by his speculative 

 theories as to the nature of protoplasm. 



But although Bathybias proved delusive, this 

 did not materially affect the advance and develop- 

 ment of the doctrine of protoplasm. Simple forms 

 of protoplasm were found, although none quite so 

 simple as the hypothetical Bathybias. The univer- 

 sal presence of protoplasm in the living parts of 

 all animals and plants and its manifest activities 

 completely demonstrated that it was the only liv- 

 ing substance, and as the result of a few years of 

 experiment and thought the biologist's conception 

 of life crystallized into something like this: Liv- 

 ing organisms are made of cells, but these cells 

 are simply minute independent bits of proto- 

 plasm. They may contain a nucleus or they may 

 not, but the essence of the cell is the protoplasm, 

 this alone having the fundamental activities of life. 

 These bits of living matter aggregate themselves 



